How Private are your Facebook Posts?

I have noticed in the last few months that some of my friends have been posting to Facebook and unknowingly making those posts public. I have wondered if those friends realized it, when I see the little globe icon next to their status. I don’t want to assume people don’t know what they’re doing in terms of privacy settings, so often I don’t reach out to ask. But sometimes it’s pretty obvious they intend a post to be “friends-only” and it’s really posting so the whole wide world can see. It’s happened about a half a dozen times that the person didn’t know it was public and either had a social catastrophe or just a long period of stepping back in time manually changing the settings on a bunch of statuses themselves.

This post is a friendly heads-up to folks to check their default settings on Facebook and be wary of what they are putting on the internet intentionally public. Sure, this is going to be “duh” to some people, but if it saves a few of you from social catastrophe, I think that’s all the better.

If a post is friends-only, the little icon next to the time stamp on the status has a couple of stick figure heads on it.If anyone knows of a campground I should look at within a couple hours of NYC, preferably also outside of Philly, let me know.

My personal Facebook account is intentionally friends-only. I sometimes crowd-source support, like when my cat Bear was dying, and I don’t need all of that stuff public.

If a post is public, the little icon next to the time stamp is a globe.

My Rebel Gateau profile is intentionally public, since I use it to promote parties. If you want to get invites to my events, friend me there!

You can also make posts custom-privacy and exclude certain people. For example, if you’re crowd-sourcing support for a recent break-up and want to exclude your ex and their besties.

If you want to check your default settings, there is an icon next to your name on the top right hand side of the page that has a lock image–that’s a shortcut to show you what your future post settings are defaulting to. If you don’t want it to be public, double check that it’s defaulting the way you want it to.

And if you find you’ve been accidentally posting publicly… nobody ever died of awkward.

In mainstream porn, I am seen as a plumper or BBW, ebony or urban. In queer porn, I am just me. I don't mind being labeled because I am ebony and I am of size, but I am also a hell of a lot more than that and in queer porn the other parts of me are valued as well. I have said this many times, porn is the only industry that can get away with being sizist, racist, classist, homophobic, ablest, and bigoted. However, if you surround yourself with empowered, fierce people it's not a problem. In mainstream, I am not small enough to be in 'regular' porn and I am not big enough to be in most BBW porns. But in queer porn, I am accept for my style, beauty, and sex appeal. I have not experienced direct negativity from being in porn when it comes to my size or ethnicity, but I have experienced indirect negativity as well as seeing my friends and others deal with it. My goal is to make my own queer fierce femme realness genre versus trying to fit in with one. I also enjoy being able to educate my heterosexual cis gendered male fans about what queer is and how sexy it can be.

My bestie Jacqueline Mary is disabled in a way where it is not readily apparent to the naked eye. Her arm was shattered in a bike accident a couple of years ago and the initial surgery restored only a small percentage of function in her arm. But because she still has her left arm and most people aren’t particularly observant, it’s not obvious right away that there’s anything different about it. She often has to tell people not to touch her arm, especially strangers in public, and sometimes people we know don’t even believe her and continue to poke, touch, even punch her in the arm because they think she’s joking. She’s also in a lot of chronic pain that has gotten worse over the last couple of months.

She posted the following note to Facebook and I really loved it. Not just because she’s my friend, but also because I thought it was an exceptional example of stating your needs and asking for help--I believe vulnerability is a sign of strength.

Welcome!

Above Photo: McKay Nield;

I'm Bevin your Femmecee at QueerFatFemme.com, where I chronicle the relentless pursuit of my joy. Life is really great when you learn to love your body and step out of the closet! I believe all bodies are good bodies and work to make the world safe for people to love themselves. I blog about body liberation, travel, plus size fashion, sexuality, relationships, spirituality, authenticity, and having a really fun life following your own inner guidance. I love Dolly Parton, Miss Piggy, Dorothy Allison and Alice Walker. Grab a cup of tea, cozy up to your computer and enjoy!

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